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I’m smoking a cigar trying to calm the fuck down, but I still can’t.
We’ve been back from the prison for several hours but I can’t shake the bad feeling I have in my gut. There’s nothing worse than feeling like your efforts made no difference.
I keep thinking of what I have to do when I get back to protect River.
We’re heading home in a few hours. Knight has just gone out to get lunch for us. He should be back soon, then we’ll be on our way, but I can’t wait to leave this place and get home to my girl.
The front door opens and Knight comes in carrying a bag of food. I can smell it from here but I’m not hungry. I can never eat when I’m in fight mode.
Knight walks over to me, sets the bag on the table between us and sits in the chair in front of me.
“I just got some sandwiches from the deli,” Knight says. I wasn’t sure what you wanted so I got a range of things.”
“Thank you. I’ll eat in a bit.”
“That’s fine.” He stares at me and I can practically see all the questions he has waiting to leap out of his head, but I know Knight won’t pounce on me and bombard me with a ton of things he might not get questions for. He’ll ask what he thinks will get him answers to the most important questions.
“Go on, ask me.” I extend the invitation because I feel like I should.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Alright, here goes. Do you remember last year when I thought my marriage was over? We sat on the beach by my house and you mentioned a girl. Do you remember that, Jericho?”
“Of course I remember.”
It was the first time that I’d mentioned that girl in years but it didn’t mean I stopped thinking about her.
Aurora had found out all that Knight had done to get her inheritance through their marriage and it nearly broke them up. That was Bastian’s fault but Knight had his own part to play. A part that didn’t excuse his actions and decisions to get what he wanted in the empire. I encouraged him not to give up because I felt it could be fixed, but I purposely let it slip that I couldn’t fix my relationship because some things can’t be fixed.
“That girl was River, wasn’t she?”
I stare back at him for a beat then nod slowly. “Yes it was her.”
“How did you guess?”
“It’s the way you look when you’re around her and when you talk about her. I could have believed the story of how you met effortlessly, but the way you looked gave you away.”
Only a brother would notice something like that.
I put out my cigar and sulk against the cushion.
“You two were a couple in high school,” he surmises.
“Yes.”
“That’s where your story changes isn’t it?” His face hardens and I realize I’m going to have to come clean with everything.
“Yes. That’s exactly right.”
“And your marriage? Did you make some arrangement with her? Something with a get out clause that makes sure you both get what you want.”
The weight of his stare pulls me under. I don’t answer that question. I don’t need to. All these long weeks and months that have gone by, but my brother would have guessed what I was up to long ago.
“What happened in high school Jericho? Or whenever you two officially broke up. Why did you keep her a secret?”
“Our fathers were rivals. That’s one reason I kept her a secret.”
